Step gently into the new year

DROP SELF JUDGEMENT
For most people December is one of the busiest months of the year. Balancing work commitments, family expectations, and festivities can leave you feeling quite depleted by the time New Years comes around. Then just when you start to think about taking the Christmas tree down, and settling back to work, you’re bombarded by ‘New Years Resolutions’. The pressure to conform, and jump on the resolution bandwagon of self judgement and retribution for those Christmas treats you may have indulged in, is amplified by the diet and fitness books displayed in every bookshop window.

AN INTENTION OF SELF CARE
Personally, I don’t consciously set a New Year resolutions, I feel all twelve months of the years should be a time for self reflection, and deepening your journey towards leading a good life with awareness of where you fit into the world. But new starts can be a good time to remind you of your intentions or kick start a new positive affirmation. Setting an intention of self care instead of self punishment is a better way to start the year. Rather than setting unrealistic goals, that will leave you feeling like a failure and, like many people, drop it by the end of January – set a feel good intention that will give you space for self reflection. Constantly monitor how any new routines makes you feel. If your resolution is filling you with dread, review it and alter your expectations. Observe and take notes – journaling helps to simplify the thought process and makes it easier to whittle out what doesn’t serve you. Take your time and make it a new part of your lifestyle rather than a temporary quick fix. Focus on how you want to feel in yourself and move gently towards a happier and healthier you.

EXPLORING STEPPING GENTLY IN YOUR PRACTICE
This sequence is designed to help you to move with slow intention and get close to your breath. Start your practice on your back with your knees bent, feet mat distance apart. Place your hands on your belly and feel the breath move through you. Take three to five rounds of this Viloma breath – inhale for a long breath, and then exhale pause, exhale pause, exhale pause – dividing your exhale into three sections.

As you move through your practice observe how your body is responding to each movement – are you getting tetchie to move more aggressively through your practice; do you want to spend more time in childs pose, are you holding your breath; do you hold tension in your facial expression? Throughout the sequence you will be working into your hips which will help you to release any built up tension and tendencies for self judgement. Move lightly through your transitions from pose to pose with just as much awareness and care that you give to the poses themselves. Enjoy a quiet time to yourself on your mat and step into your new year gently.

ALIGNMENT CUES
As you flow through this sequence step so lightly like you are stepping into a room with a sleeping baby. Feel into every transition in and out of each pose and make them just as important as the poses themselves.

• In the first few poses give your hips plenty of time to warm up. When you are moving through the hip rotations move very slowly and make the movements as small as they need to be to really feel the top of the hip bone stirring in it socket.

• Run through Cat Cow Child Pose flow in row two as many times as you’d like. Link each movement with your breath and let the breath dictate when you are ready to move into the next pose in this mini flow. ‘+’ is an inhale and ‘+’ is an inhale. Pause in child pose after and absorb and assimilate your movement.

• For half forward fold press your hands into your shins and reach your chest forward to feel the strength in your upper back. Pause here in this mini flow of row three.

• Your final pose is a lovely restorative hip opener Supta Baddha Konasana. The yoga strap hoops around your hips, outside your shins and wraps around the soles of your feet. If you don’t have a yoga strap just place some pillows under your knees to prop them up. Stay here for your full Savasana or move to supine Savasana is you prefer.

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Ruth Delahunty Yogaru

A simple Christmas flow

CHRISTMAS MINDFULNESS
I have to admit I love Christmas with all its bells and whistles. But last year stopped me in my festive tracks when we faced a family challenge and Christmas passed by in a bit of a blur. It made me more mindful and understanding of people who, for one reason or another, don’t particularly like Christmas.

Whether you are a Christmas fan or not, your home practice can be your best friend over the festive period. Taking a bit of time to yourself everyday, will help you to take on all that comes with this busy time of year. The only thing you need to practice yoga is intention. Intention for self care, a curiosity to explore and the ability to listen carefully to what you need.

PAUSE & RECENTRE
Try the above sequence over the Christmas period. It will give you a bit of everything to support you over the coming weeks. Flow through the whole sequence or pick one of the Sun Salutation flow options and one of the standing flow options. Mix it up and try something new each day, or for a meditative flow, practice the same sequence each day. Remember getting on your mat for a simple 10 minute practice is better than not getting on your mat at all.

Along with your home practice you might like to try one of the Christmas retreat workshops that lots of the yoga studios offer for the week between Christmas and New Years. I will definitely be treating myself to a morning workshop with Aisling Conn in The Yoga Room.

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year

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Ruth Delahunty Yogaru

Strong back body

THE FORGOTTEN BACK BODY
With the winter nip in the air you start to notice how much the body closes in to protect itself against the colder weather. The muscles of the spine were created to keep us upright. They become weakened from sitting for long periods of time, and as a result, don’t have the strength to do the important job of stabilising against gravity as we move. Strengthening the back body in yoga helps to keep an upright posture, counteracting curled in shoulders, a hunched back, and helps prepare the lower body for safer forward folds. Following on from my upper back strength sequence I started to explore down the full length of the back body – adding the lower back, glutes, outer hips, hamstrings and calf muscles. When we visualise our bodies we think of our front body, and the poor back body often gets ignored. If we gave our back body a bit more love and attention we might be better equipped to avoid back pain, hip instability, and pulled hamstrings.

STRENGTHEN TO STRETCH
For a long time I thought that to stretch the back body you need to do lots of forward folds. Not necessarily so! Before you stretch out a muscle you need to strengthen it first to warm it up, wake up the connective tissues, and bring fresh blood to the muscles. Strengthening is not to be confused with tightening a muscle. Tightness comes from repeated strengthening with no stretching. There is so many variations of posture in yoga that every muscle is being stretched and strengthened during your time on the mat. Taking a poses like Salabhasana/Locust will strengthen the whole back body before going into deeper forward folds. Utkatasana/Chair will wakes up the strong muscles of the legs, outer glutes and the outer hips. With the arms raised you are also working the muscles of the back and shoulders. Hold the poses till you feel the muscles working to create stability and strength. You will find the whole back body more receptive to opening up to forward folds when you have warmed it up, and switched it on first.

DOWNWARD DOG
After warming up the back body with Salabhasana/Locust and Utkatasana/Chair, spend plenty of time in Downward Dog to ease into any deeper forward folds. It will start to gently lengthen out the back of the legs and stretches out the upper back and shoulders. Work on tipping the pelvis forward towards your upper thighs and reaching your sit bones up high. There are three rounds of the downward dog flow in the above sequence. Place your feet mat width for your first round, hip width for the second, and all going well, together for the third round. You’ll notice the closer the legs are together the more of a stretch is required in the backs of the legs. Taking chair pose with the legs at different widths will also work slightly different hip muscles and continue to strengthen the back body between forward folds.

Try the sequence above and bring all your attention to your back body as you move through the practice.

To save the images for personal use click and hold down the image until the ‘save image’ option appears; on Mac hold down ‘control’ and click the image to get the option box; on PC right click on the image to get the option box. Scroll down in the ‘option box’ and click ‘save image’.

Ruth Delahunty Yogaru